


Mother's Day

by Higgles123



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Gen, Love, Mother's Day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-22 07:20:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30035088
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Higgles123/pseuds/Higgles123
Summary: Today is Mother's Day in the UK and I just couldn't help myself but write this piece on Alfie thinking of his mother on this day
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7





	Mother's Day

Mother’s Day is always such a bittersweet day for Alfie. On the one hand he loves helping the kids make a huge fuss of his wife, with homemade cards and flowers and gifts that he helped them select. She deserves it because her entire life is devoted to raising their children and he could wish for no better woman to guide them in life. She makes them giggle when they’re grumpy and wipes their tears when they’re sad. She apologises when she loses her temper and doesn’t make them think that just because she’s their mother that it’s alright for her to make them feel small and insignificant. She admits when she was wrong and teaches them kindly when they are the ones in the wrong. One whole day dedicated to her doesn’t seem enough in Alfie’s eyes.

On the other hand, this very day fills Alfie with such sadness that makes his heart ache terribly because he wishes more than anything his own mother was still alive. Every year when the children are cuddled up in bed with Ava eating breakfast, Alfie takes time to be with his mother. Not in the literal sense of course, but when he sits beside her pictures in the conservatory he feels her there in spirit. He supposes it’s a sort of shrine to her in there; pictures of her and a little box full of some of her things. He opens the lid and fingers each item with reverence; smiling with tears in his eyes as he thinks about the memory attached to each thing. The stone in the shape of a heart found on their first trip to Margate together when he was ten; the thimble she used when she was trying to make ends meet sewing clothes after his old man buggered off; the butterfly brooch he bought her when he finally started to make something of himself. There were so many little nick knacks in that box and it pained him to think that that was all that was left of his mother now. His children would never know how soft her skin was and how lovely she smelled when she leaned in for an embrace. They would never see the way her eyes twinkled when she smiled, nor would they ever feel the wooden spoon on the back of their legs when they misbehaved. Although, perhaps that one wasn’t such a bad thing.

“Oh Mum,” he sighed, picking up the picture of her that he had taken a few months before she died. She was stood on the beach at Margate, trying to hold down her skirt in the wind and laughing. She looked so carefree and so happy. “I always thought that when you lost someone, the pain was supposed to go away after a time; that it was supposed to stop hurtin’ as much, but that’s a lie, aint it? Because every day that passes, I find myself missin’ you even more than the day before. My heart weeps for you every time one of the kids does somethin’ funny and I wanna call you and tell you, or when I think I’m shit at this parentin’ business and I need your advice. The pain doesn’t get easier at all; it just gets easier to hide it.

Raisa was askin’ me about you the other day. She’s desperate to know about her namesake and I was more than happy to tell her. But all I could think about when I was speakin’ to her was how my words weren’t doin’ you justice. I wish for even just one hour my children could be with you and hug you and talk to you. I wish for even just one hour _I_ could hug you and talk to you again. I would hug you so hard and never let you go. I would tell you that you were the best mum anyone could ever want, and that I’m sorry for all those times I used to get myself in trouble and make you cry. I would tell you that when Soraya scowls she looks just like you and that Hannah has developed your love of readin’. I would thank you for makin’ me into the man I am today and for sendin’ Ava to me, because I know for a fact you must have had a hand in that. And before it was time for you to leave I would give you a bunch of daffodils because I know they’re your favourite and then I would hold you in my arms and dance to your favourite song with you.

I was blessed to have you as my Mum, and I still am. I love you more than I can ever put into words and I can’t wait to see you again one day, my beautiful mum. Happy Mother’s Day.”


End file.
